


When The Tide Comes In

by CeliPuff



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Afterlife, Angst with a Happy Ending, As Happy As I Could Make It, Castiel and Dean Winchester First Meet, Castiel/Dean Winchester One Shot, Character Death, Coffee Shops, Everything is Beautiful and Everything Hurts, Fluff and Angst, Grief/Mourning, Heartbroken Castiel (Supernatural), Heavy Angst, I'm Sorry, Loss, M/M, Meet-Cute, Meet-Ugly, Soulmates, Sudden Death, This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things, Why Did I Write This?, You Have Been Warned
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-16
Updated: 2020-09-16
Packaged: 2021-03-06 22:41:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,162
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26496562
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CeliPuff/pseuds/CeliPuff
Summary: Falling for Dean Winchester was easy, moving on was impossible.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Comments: 29
Kudos: 54





	When The Tide Comes In

**Author's Note:**

> I’m very sorry for this one, but I had to write it down. It came to me in a dream and woke me up from a dead sleep at 1am... I cried the entire time I was typing. It’s short, but these are real emotions that I have experienced personally with grief. No two people grieve the same, and that is okay but I hope I expressed it well enough for a reader to understand. 
> 
> Thank you Ketch22, Darkness Bound and I_Am_The_Blue_Sunshine for putting up with me and helping me edit it when I couldn’t bring myself to read it back again. 
> 
> Another huge shout out to Blue for the amazingly stunning art she drew here. Words can’t even express how thankful I am that you even read my one shot, let alone took the time to draw for it. I don’t deserve you. 
> 
> Again for my readers, I am sorry. I probably won’t ever post anything like this again but no promises. Sometimes I need to get things out of my head so I can move on and sometimes I have to make people suffer with me.

“No, I swear. He was runni—” Castiel swings his arm to point in the direction he saw a cow running down the street, but when he does he hits a man in the head so hard he makes an _‘ahh’_ noise. “Shit. I’m sorry.”

“Nah,” he says. “It’s fine. Don’t need my head today.” It’s a joke, but it helps Cas’ conscience, and when they lock eyes for the first time, Castiel is lost in a sea of green.

“Uh… I… I was telling this woman about a cow I saw, I should have paid more attention.” _Not the best start, Castiel._

“A cow? Downtown?” The beautiful man stands straighter. “Shit, that’s kinda awesome.” He’s still holding his head and Cas fights the urge to reach out. He has the most gorgeous freckles peppering his nose and cheeks, and the most perfect pouty lips Cas has ever seen. Based on his reaction to the cow, he thinks they would get along pretty well.

“Let me buy your coffee.” Cas waves to the counter as they take another step closer to the register. 

“Nah, you don’t have to. Not like I have a concussion, I just already had a headache.” He moves his hand away to ease Cas’ guilt but his head is still hurting, Cas can tell.

“I insist. What are you having?” 

The man smiles widely for the first time and it was that exact moment Cas knew he wanted to see that smile for the rest of his life. “Just a coffee. I’m Dean.” He holds out his big rough hand and Cas takes it in his, practically melting to the touch.

“Castiel. But you can call me Cas.” 

“Alright, Cas. You can buy my coffee, but after that I wanna hear about this cow. I’ll get us some seats.” He winks and walks away before Cas can answer, but it doesn’t matter. Of course he’ll have coffee with Dean. His meeting can wait. The world can wait. 

He texts his coworkers to say he isn’t feeling well today, then orders their coffee. He catches Dean rubbing his temples again and to surprise him, he also orders a slice of cherry pie. 

The look on Dean’s face when he sees the pie is better than a million sunrises. “Cas… how’d you know I loved pie?”

“I didn’t. I just wanted to make up for your head injury.” He offered a smile and Dean took a huge bite, sitting back with a grin.

“Man… Should we just go to Vegas and get married then, or wait a while?” Dean’s joking but Cas is tempted to say yes.

“Maybe wait a little while?” He jokes back and takes a sip of coffee.

Their conversation flows as easy as wind in the fall, and when they realize that three hours have passed, it seems like neither want to leave. But Dean’s headache has returned and after exchanging numbers, they say goodbye. 

Dean texts before Cas climbs into his car and as the saying goes, the rest is history. 

Their first real date starts with apple pie and ends with their first kiss. It’s slow as they navigate each other’s mouths and when Dean’s hands roam his body Cas is ready to go all the way. But, ever the gentleman, Dean pulls away and waits until Cas is inside his apartment to drive away.

Their second date, they have less control. It ends with them frotting in the backseat of Dean’s gorgeous Impala, and the awkward _I’m clean_ conversation they have after ends with them both laughing about how late that conversation is. 

It’s all as easy as breathing.

The first time they have sex is filled with raw, palpable passion. When they come together, Cas nearly confesses his love right then. 

Dean’s headache returns, and when he leaves soon after the sex Cas knows he should be worried that Dean just hit it and quit it, but he’s much too worried about those headaches. He gets them too often and continuously brushes them off.

They talk for days, have some more dates that end with amazing sex and when the sun begins to set three weeks after they met, Cas asks Dean to come stay the night. He misses him already and when Dean agrees Cas rushes to the kitchen to bake him a pie.

Unfortunately, he burns it. 

The pie burns because the second Dean walks through his door Cas jumps on him and ends up riding him on his living room floor. Deep down, Cas knows it doesn’t get better than this, and based on Dean’s after orgasm glow, he knows it too.

“Shit, the pie.” Cas gets off him and runs to the oven, smiling when he feels Dean’s spend dripping down his thigh.

“Pie? You made me pie?” Dean stands quickly and slides up his boxers and basketball shorts. He doesn’t bother with a shirt and Cas is thankful. He could stare at the strong lines on Dean’s body until the end of time. 

Cas pulls out the pie and stares down at the hopeless burnt crust, wishing he planned better so Dean could have pie while his cheeks are still flushed from sex. 

He hears Dean whisper, “Cas…” but when he looks up, he doesn’t see Dean. He hears the crash of that gorgeous body collapsing onto his hardwood floor, and by the time he rushes to check on him he is unconscious.

He instantly calls 911 and they’re there in minutes, rushing him away with nothing more than a hospital name to meet them at. 

Cas dresses in a daze, thinking about how cold Dean must be without a shirt. He brings him one from the backpack he set near the door, and when he walks into the hospital he’s directed to a waiting room where he sits for hours.

They tell him Dean had an aneurysm that ruptured, followed by a stroke.

He’s unresponsive. 

Cas cries before he finds the strength to enter his room, but when he finally does, his world shatters.

Dean is laying there, tubes down his throat with machines filling the silence. He’s laying there, but he isn’t there. 

Doctors say there isn’t anything they can do. There is nothing to save, the body before them — that beautiful beyond perfect body — is a shell.

_It isn’t fair… we didn’t get enough time. I… didn’t get enough time._

Castiel holds his hand as if he might float away, but Dean’s hand is loose in his. 

Because he’s gone. 

Dean is gone.

Hours pass before another nurse comes in to check on him, and by this time Cas is resting his forehead against that lifeless hand. When they tell him Dean’s next of kin is on the way, he takes the time to kiss every finger on that hand. He smells it, but the smell of Dean is already fading away. It smells like hospital… _he,_ smells like hospital.

Not like warm apple pie, or fresh brewed coffee, or that damned delicious cologne that Cas has never smelled on another man and his brain has already linked to Dean Winchester. The love of his life. 

It wasn’t love if you ask anyone around them. _‘You just met,’_ some would say. Or, _‘you didn’t even know that much about each other.’_ In a textbook sense, they are correct on both counts, but those facts could never diminish their love. 

They didn’t have hard times. They didn’t have a first fight or make up sex. They didn’t get to, and they never will. Every single memory Castiel has is good. Every single memory of Dean is warm. 

In Castiel’s mind, Dean did no wrong and nothing will _ever_ change that. 

A tall man with long auburn hair walks in. He has red rings around his eyes and he stares at Dean as if no one else is in the room. 

_Sam. It has to be, Sam._

Castiel moves aside, allowing this poor man to grieve the loss of his elder brother in peace. He slips outside and being even this far away from Dean feels wrong. Everything feels wrong. 

He paces the hallway for what feels like an hour, and when Sam peeks his head out and ushers him in, he obliges. “Are you, Castiel?” Sam sniffles and Cas smiles a weak smile at the fact that Dean told his brother about him.

“Yes. And you’re Sam?” His voice is raw from hours of silence and he has to clear his throat. 

“Yeah.” They don’t speak again for a while. They don’t have to. 

When Sam begins to cry, Cas doesn’t hesitate to walk over and hug him. They don’t know each other, they’ve never even shook hands or had a conversation, but they hold each other and allow the other to share their pain. 

They don’t know each other, but they are bonded in grief for a man too beautiful for this earth.

When the doctors come to say it’s time, they’re both completely consumed with the weight of unsaid words. They each hold a hand as Dean fades away, and when the tide comes in, they both refuse to leave.

They have a few more hours with him before he begins to stiffen and it’s time to say goodbye to the most stunning shell ever created. 

The first time Cas walks out of the hospital, he feels betrayed by the world around him. _How can anyone be smiling? How is everyone walking around as if the world is fine when it isn’t? It isn’t! Nothing is fine!_ The entire world should feel this loss because Dean wasn’t just taken from Cas, he was taken from the universe. 

It is a life changing loss that anyone who was ever lucky enough to hear one of Dean’s crude jokes or feel one of his hugs will carry until their last breath.

The funeral is packed with Dean’s loved ones and he listens to stories about him for hours, each story making him fall more and more in love with someone that is already gone.

_If he is gone, why do I still feel him?_

He feels him every night when he lays down on the pillow he put Dean’s shirt on. He feels those strong arms wrap around him, and he knows Dean is telling him it’s okay, but it isn’t.

Food tastes different.

Sleep feels broken.

The world feels imbalanced.

The first time Cas laughs he feels as though he’s betrayed Dean and he cries for hours to make up for it.

Deep down, he knows Dean would never want this, but the pain is too heavy. Breathing has become difficult, and every single little thing hurts. He often reminds himself of a quote from a book he read a long time ago;

_‘That’s the thing about pain, it demands to be felt.’_

The first time he smells that cologne on another man, he stops breathing and instantly hates him. He hates that man for wearing that cologne, for walking around, for being alive when Dean is not. 

_It isn’t fair! Nothing is fucking fair!_

He and Sam become best friends while the world moves on, because no matter what happens, neither of them _can_ move on and after a few months, Sam’s stories are repeats, but Castiel doesn’t care. He still listens, still hangs on to every word because _this_ is how Dean’s memory stays alive. 

A year later, Cas still can’t eat pie. He can’t go near that coffee shop they met at. He can’t even watch certain movies or listen to certain songs that Dean quoted in their short time together; because even though a year has passed, the void in his chest isn’t filled, it never will be.

When he finally meets someone, it starts as a friendship. They meet in grief therapy and this man has also lost the love of his life. It makes things easy. Cas is with a man that knows he will never take Dean’s place, and Cas knows he will never take the place of his late husband. It works.

They live a long and healthy life together and even on Castiel’s death bed, he still aches for Dean Winchester. The hopefulness he feels as he slips away isn’t for heaven, it’s for the one man he hopes to see there, and when he opens that door and steps inside…

He’s there.

Dean is there. 

“Dean?” He asks, begging this to not be another cruel dream, but Dean smiles that boyish grin. That grin he had moments before he collapsed in Castiel’s apartment and was lost forever.

“Hey, Cas.” His voice is the same. None of Cas’ dreams ever did that voice justice, but _this_ is Dean’s voice. Dean cups his chin and places a soft kiss to Cas’ lips, but it ends quickly because he is still smiling. Before Cas can ask why he is smiling, Dean tells him. “I’ve been waiting for you.” 

**Author's Note:**

> That’s the thing about pain, it demands to be felt.  
> -John Green
> 
> Death leaves a heartache no one can heal, love leaves a memory no one can steal.  
> -Richard Puz


End file.
